Release the Dragon
by muaaimoi
Summary: Magical Medieval AU. Or in which Sheldon makes a terrible dragon and Penny is even worse at being a damsel in distress. Shenny as always.
1. Chapter 1

**1.**

Sheldon is one of the better warlocks of his order. This does not make him particularly well liked. It probably doesn't help that he tends to shun his fellows for the ancient tomes that line the halls. He's long adjusted to the whispers about him. They way the mock him about his tendency to hoard knowledge. The dragon they call him, the name follows him through the years, unsubtle whispers behind his back.

He knows better than to pay them any mind. It helps that not all of his peers are determined to torment him. There are a few acquaintances that he slowly begins to consider friends. Mostly through his roommate, Leonard. They are more tolerable than the vast majority of his so called brethren. But Sheldon doesn't have to deal with the masses too often.

Especially once he learned to ward his rooms and possessions appropriately. They claim he keeps secret knowledge, knows unspeakable scripture, they do their best to mask their own incompetence. He is ten times the warlock any one of them is, and they have never manage to get pass even one of his most basic enchantments.

He's quick to move up in the ranks. A rising star, in his own words, and a freak of nature to the fellows of his orders. He finds it easier and easier to ignore the scorn the more involved he becomes in the magic. It fascinates him, consumes him. There is scarcely more to his world. It's all he thinks about.

He doesn't realize the danger.

Doesn't see the jealousy in his professors. Misses the growing discontent among those he considers friends. When the offer of studying mystical caves in the mountains as head of the project comes, he is delighted. Doesn't see the trap for what it is. Considers it one of the most amazing opportunities of his life. Right alongside the invitation to learn magic in the first place, despite it making his own mother part of the crowd that attempted to burn him as a witch. Learning magic is still one of the best decisions he's ever made, of course he jumps at the chance to learn more of the arcane. He invites his friends along. Throws himself into translating the ancient runes and gleaning all the magic he can from the ruins.

He does feel the wave of magic coming towards him before it arrive, however. Manages a protection spell between one heartbeat and the next. The magics collide, twist and tear at him from within. Warp everything that he is. The agony of it follows him into darkness. Once he wakes he finds that he is much larger than he should be. Reptilian where he wasn't, with two great midnight blue wings he could only examine out out of the corner of his eyes.

A distressed rumbling leaves his throat. He supposes it's the draconian equivalent of 'Oh dear.'

**2.**

Three days, Penny thinks to herself bitterly.

That was all it took, three days for her world to end. One moment she was just another village girl, and the next she had been chosen, declared the loveliest maiden in all of Omaha. The Corn Queen they called her. It was supposed to be a great honor, for all that every village girl hoped and prayed that they were never chosen to wear the crown, not once the dragon had come. As if a fancy title made her fate any better. As if any fate could be worse.

Angry tears dripped from her face as she thrashed against her bindings. The rope bit into her wrist, but the pain didn't register past the agony of the betrayal. A roar sounded in the distance and she froze, her body going involuntarily still. Penny had never known fear like this. It gripped her chest tight, settled in her spine. It took everything she had just to breathe.

Tethered to a pole in the middle of the village square, abandoned by everyone she had ever known. She was left to die. Just another unwilling offering in a long line of helpless, bound girls. Too young to be called women, but too old not to know just what really happened when the Dragon came to carry her off. She would die so that the cowards in her village might live.

She almost hoped they didn't. She almost hoped that the Dragon found her an unfitting meal and burned the Village to the ground. She almost hoped. But this was Omaha. It had been the only home she had ever known. It was where her family lived, traitorous scum that they were. Somehow leaving her to die hadn't erased the entirety of her love for them. If only they had fought for her. If only they had tried to offer themselves instead, the way she would have, if any of them had been chosen. Maybe then she could have offered herself gladly. Met her fate with her head held high, knowing that she was dying for people that loved her.

They hadn't even given her that.

All her father had done was bow his head. Her mother had at least dressed her in the finest gown she owned. Her sister had combed her hair, woven flowers through it. Her brother hadn't even appeared at her send off feast.

And now all that was left was for her to die alone. Sacrificed to the dragon that haunted their mountain. Penny forced herself to crane her head up. She would die as she had lived, beautiful and brave, even if no one else was around to see it. The thought didn't help her keep a shrill shriek at bay as the dragon swooped down and snatched her up with his claws.

**3.**

It takes him an embarrassingly long time to adjust to being a dragon.

His first attempts at contacting his order for assistance are naive and in vain. He's equally embarrassed by the fact that he doesn't understand the betrayal until he has several knights set on him. It isn't terribly difficult to fight them off using fire, fangs, or claw, but there is distressingly little magic available in his new form. Despite the sheer potency of the magic he can feel in his new scales. He needs only to think of a way to access it.

For a time he considers revenge. Ravaging the castle that once housed him, and reaping vengeance on those who had been jealous of his power. But in the end he finds that he has his priorities straight. He is a dragon. And dealing with the new reality of being a magical creature takes precedence over revenge. Not that he doesn't plan to pursue his vengeance. It is simply that it can wait. Whereas learning to fly cannot.

He needs to figure out how to become human again. He doesn't know how to do magic as a dragon. Can't write his usual missives and magic them to his grandmother, his Meemaw, the clever hedge witch that had saved him from being burned alive. He hates to distress her.

So he flies away.

Far away. To a mountain full of caves that seems perilous to climb. Settles in to figure out his new shape and how to turn himself human again. He's flying in an attempt to find sustenance when he spots a witch burning in the town at the valley of his new mountain. His memories of Meemaw demand he interfere.

**4.**

Flying was terrifying.

At least at first. She had never been so high up before, and she had no way of knowing how long they flew. Her village seemed smaller and smaller as they flew further from the ground. Penny couldn't control the breathless giggle that bubbled up. She was flying. It might be the last thing she ever did, but it was amazing. Her fear ebbed and flowed with every powerful beat of the dragons wings. Gliding along the winds, rocking her carefully in the cage of it's talons. Penny almost felt like she could enjoy the sheer novelty of it. She was up so high.

How many people could say they had seen the land from the sky? Like a bird, or a cloud. She had been part of the heavens from some time. The weightless happiness leaves her as soon as they begin to land.

The Dragons claws tighten and Penny thinks it's the end. That it will rend her limb from limb with it's claws before it feasts on her corpse.

It doesn't.

It dumps her, none too gently, on the ground. There is a cut on her palm from where the claws had nicked her, and the grass burns against it when she goes on her hand and knees, caught between automatically pushing herself up and the knowledge that she's about to die. She goes still, terrified. Will it burn her alive instead? Roast her with it's fire. She stays frozen in fear for what feels like forever before she realizes that it's flown away.

She looks up at the sky, expecting to see it roaming. Perhaps it wants to chase her down the way hunters enjoy hunting down game? She doesn't spot hide nor hair of it and supposes it doesn't.

She doesn't understand.

But she's alive, nothing seems immediately predisposed to kill her, so her day is definitely looking up. She starts looking for shelter. She doesn't know why the Dragon had spared her life, but she doesn't want to be found should it change it's mind.

**5.**

Sheldon has a bit of a breakthrough in his attempt to regain humanity. It's mostly due to the village girls blood on his claws, and he considers them fully even despite having just saved her life. It isn't much, not the careful, steady hands he once wielded, but surely having his voice back is useful? Or he supposes it would be, if he had anyone to talk to.

Loneliness has never been an affliction he'd actively suffered from. There was always an experiment to run, or something new to learn that helped him push the feeling to the back of his mind. He'd also been unable to avoid others completely, having to interact with people in order to get food, or check books out of the library. It always served as a reminder of how much better off he was without others. He'd once dreamed of becoming a hermit. Now that he's been forced to become one by circumstance, he's surprised by how lonely he feels now.

He considers the village girl again. Surely the trek down the mountain would take sometime, perhaps, now that he could speak, he could offer her a ride. He imagined it would be less alarming to be approached by a dragon now that he could make his intentions clear.

He tracks her down by scent and finds her sleeping in the hollow of an old tree. He accidentally crushes the trunk when he attempts to nudge her awake. She shrieks and he realizes that he has failed. She seems very alarmed indeed.

**x**

**I don't even know y'all. I seem to be in a mood to write magical medieval Au's? I didn't know that was thing, but apparently... I've started like three in the past few days. This one is the one with the most finishing potential. Also this is gonna be a three shot, please tell me what you think? I don't have a very concrete idea of where I'm going with this...**


	2. Chapter 2

6.

Penny wakes to a sharp crack and the sight of the Dragon hovering over her. Her heart feels like it stops-just stops. Because there is no way it can contain the fear and horror coursing through her. She'd thought she'd gotten away. Sure she'd worried about wolves, or not being able to find sustenance on the mountain. But the concerns never seemed terribly pressing when she no longer had to face being eaten by the Dragon. To find it hovering over her was worse than before. At least she'd been prepared then. She'd been expecting to die. She hadn't had any hope, she'd been ready to die with her head held high.

Now-Penny closed her eyes and awaits a pain the like of which she hadn't dared to imagine...It doesn't come. She's corpse still, holding her breath, and nothing happens. Her heartbeat sounds like war drums in her ears, and she doesn't know how long it takes for her to realize that she can hear a voice. Let alone how long it takes to realize that the voice is speaking to her.

"...Alright?"

Penny opens her eyes and can't quite comprehend what she sees. Is the Dragon-is the Dragon speaking? To her?

"Have you run afoul of a fellow witch and found yourself cursed?"The Dragon, and Penny was still having trouble believing it because she'd never heard tell of it being so much as a possibility, asked.

"I'm not a witch!"Penny says, mouth running before she could think better of it.

"There is no sense in denying it."The Dragon chides,"I did save you from being burned at the stake."

The silence that follows that particular pronouncement is thick with her disbelief. The Dragon doesn't seem to notice, flicking its tail like a particularly satisfied cat. Now that fear isn't slowing her brain to a crawl she can look at it properly. It's huge, easily four times the length of her former home.

But Penny can't quite wrap her mind around what she's hearing,"Saved me? They sacrificed me to you! Just like they sacrificed every Corn Queen on the Sabbath ever since you flew over our village and decide to live in the mountain!"

"Why ever would they do something as foolish as that?" The Dragons great, frilled head came closer, studying her intensely with slitted eyes bluer than the very skies."I have no interest in sacrifice."

Penny just didn't understand. At least she wasn't dead-yet. And she might just survive the second encounter. If the Dragon was being honest, and truly had no interest in her as a sacrifice.

7.

Sheldon examines the maiden that the villagers had chosen as a sacrifice. She was lovely of course, a beautiful maiden indeed. No doubt as close to a princess as a village girl could get. As had been the other girls that had come before her. Sacrifice, such a silly notion. There was no appeasing a true Dragon if one was unfortunate enough to ignite their rage. He wasn't a true Dragon regardless, merely an enchanted wizard, as he informed the Village maiden.

"And to think, all this time I thought I was being noble, rescuing my fellow magic practitioners. Did the first Village girl they 'sacrifice' never return to clarify my intentions?"

"No."She scowled at him,"No one ever made it back! They probably died, if you just left them in the forest of the mountains. Village girls aren't suited to surviving in mountains! There are wolves, and nearly no food. There isn't even a river anywhere near where you left me!"

"And yet you are faring rather well,"Sheldon mused aloud. He had never considered the fate of the women he had rescued. He had considered his duty to them done by saving them from burning to death. But it seemed he had been the reason they had been tied against a pole in the village square in the first place. He could see the girl's point, the others before her had likely met their end at the hand of the perils of the mountain. When he considered the lack of magic it made the girls survival thus far rather impressive-in fact"Are you quite sure you're not a witch?"

"I'm not a witch!"The girl exclaimed, firm.

"Would you like to be?"Sheldon offered."Magic is far simpler than most are led to believe. Especially if one has the use of opposable thumbs."

The girl gaped at him,"No, why would I want to be a witch? They are hideous and vile-"

"Nonsense,"Sheldon disagreed."Magic is often vilified by those who cannot practice it. You have the gift, why not use it?" There were many spells he couldn't cast due to his condition. Sheldon missed his creature comforts. And the girls magic had to be particularly potent, otherwise her blood wouldn't have worked as well as it did. Dragon tongues were not made to wield human words. And yet Sheldon did not have to suffer any discomfort to communicate.

"I do?"The girl asked, voice soft.

Sheldon nods,"Would you like me to teach you? What is your name?"

"Penny,"The girl says, a whisper at best. But Dragon ears work far better than his human ones ever did. He hears her just fine.

"Well then Penny, I accept you as my apprentice."He had never brought into his fellow magicians belief that women had no true talent for magic. His Meemaw had been quite the adept practitioner. She had taught him more than any number of his professors. He would make sure his apprentice would be fearsome indeed. Ensure she was both strong and wise. So that she may never find herself in his place.

8.

The dragon was beautiful. The thought sneaks in every once in a while, unbidden. When the sun hits the dark scales just right and she can find the blue in them. The Dragon is beautiful, he teaches her magic, makes her stronger, better. The Dragon, the most feared creature she'd ever heard of, is wonderful, harsh task master that he can be on occasion. She never thought life could be like this.

Penny looks at Sheldon, the Wizard cursed to be a Dragon of all things (and what a story that tale had been!), and comes to the realization that she's happy. Genuinely happy. It's a feeling she'd nearly forgotten existed, amid the tedium of tending to the cornfields and awaiting for her mother to find her a suitable match. She hadn't been eager to find a husband.

Her life had been so much more exciting when she had been younger. She'd heard all sorts of faery tales at her grandmothers skirts. Played pretend she was a princess to her heart's content. Eyed the better looking males around the village and wondered at who would one day be her prince. She'd almost run away once. There had been a particularly strapping lad called Kurt who had courted her. Promised her a life full of wonder and happiness. Sneaking away to see him had been the most excitement Penny had ever known. But her father had caught her one time too many, and told her on no uncertain terms what happened when a woman wasn't pure for her wedding day.

It had been the end of that. Kurt had lost interest when she had stopped responding to what she had come to realize was a slow seduction. He'd had no interest in marrying her. No interest in being with her beyond what lay under her skirts. Penny had been heart-broken.

Now, she woke up to magic lessons everyday. Learned new things constantly, saw things she could have never imagined. Flying on a Dragons back especially was a pleasure she had never dreamed she could enjoy.

If she stops to think about it, some part of her had known it wouldn't last. Nothing that made her happy ever did.

9.

Sheldon is surprised by the village girls aptitude.

Penny, he finds, is a surprising person in general. They spend months learning each other. He comes to find her bravery worthy of his respect, and her stupidity worth his scorn. There is often a very fine line separating one from the other. But her stubbornness is often a match for his own, and he doesn't know whether or not he has been fortunate, to find companionship in someone who willingly goes head to head with a Dragon.

But then-Penny is someone who enjoys flying on his back. Takes to the reconnaissance missions he sends her to villages on with a near disturbing enthusiasm. Her prowess with attack spells has him glowing with pride, and it takes no time at all until she becomes someone he would call dangerous. Oh, he would have still crossed her had the situation called when he had been a sorcerer. But he would have thought twice about it, refuse to engage her until he had taken several precautions.

He'd considered setting her on his enemies, knowing retribution would have been brutal and swift. But he would prefer for his vengeance to be more personal, face to face, once he recovers his original one, of course.

The days pass swiftly. He enjoys guiding Penny with his knowledge. Likes the new state of their domicile. It had taken some doing to arrange a hot spring, but they managed. Penny's simple village upbringing had robbed her of many things it seemed. She'd seemed particularly mystified about why Sheldon had worked so hard for his hot spring (which was more of a hot lake really, considering the dimensions they had to broaden it to in order for him to submerge his draconic body.), until she took a dip of course. Then she had doubled her efforts to learn every other spell that would enable them some more creature comforts in their cave.

For a time they fall into a rhythm. It's easier, more comfortable, than anything he'd ever experienced as a mere mortal.

Then he smells smoke.

10.

Sheldon tells her the villagers have gathered with torches and pitch forks. Penny finds herself almost impressed by their daring. Fear of the Dragon had been commonplace in their village. The idea of so many of them being so brave is almost hard to believe.

"Are you going to drive them of?"Penny asks, curious but not terribly worried. Sheldon hadn't lied when he claimed he had no interest in sacrifice. He was not someone interested in slaughter for slaughter sake. All bets where off once he'd been wronged though, as she was sure the wizards who betrayed him would soon find out. Just as soon as they figured out how to turn him back.

"They seem rather determined."Sheldon sighed,"It seems they have brought a knight. I do not understand why people regard them so highly. They have no magic. Merely armor."

"A knight?"Penny asks, delighted. She had never laid eyes on a knight before. She quickly casts a spying spell Sheldon had taught her, and quickly dropped it in surprise. Her father. She had just seen her father, torch in hand. Was he coming to seek vengeance for her life? Penny frowned. She didn't want him to know she was alive. Not when he had been ready to sacrifice her before. He didn't deserve to know that she had survived. That the Dragon had never actively killed any of the women they had sacrificed to him.

"Penny?"Sheldon questioned,"are you alright?"

"Will you fight them? If they attack you, will you fight them?" She may not be happy with her father, but she does love him still. Feels sick at the thought of him hurt, maimed by Sheldon's claws or his flames.

"Of course,"Sheldon affirmed.

"And if I asked you not to?"Penny asked, hopeful. Sheldon had been kind to her all this time. Perhaps he would be kind again.

"As I see it we have two options. Wait here and engage the murderous ob. Or leave our home, the mountain."He did not sound like he wanted to leave.

"We can always find another, can't we? I'm better with the spells we used on the cave than I was before, surely our new home will be better than this one." Penny pointed out.

Sheldon sighed, deeply this time, the funny storm smell of his dragon breath filling the cave."I would like to point out that we are not fleeing. I am merely indulging your desire not to hurt those from your former village."

Penny beamed. She'd been right then. Sheldon had been kind again, but then, he had always been to her, she'd had no reason to doubt him.

They fly away.

x

**Sorry this took longer than I thought. I changed my mind on a plot point while I edited so I had to rework a few things. On a brighter note, that plot point is now being worked into another story, so you know, not a total loss. Hope you guys enjoy this, let me know**


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